Walsh Shares Research and Talent To Help the Industry and the Community

Walsh Construction is busy, building affordable housing throughout the region. It is also dedicated to sustainable projects, evidenced by being 5th on ENR’s list of green contractors.

By Lucy Bodilly

Thornton Place, in North Seattle, includes retail space, apartments, condos and a senior living facility. Walsh built the market rate housing, and daylighting and landscaping for Thornton Creek

Portland - Walsh Construction, Portland, calls itself the biggest non-profit construction company in the Northwest, even though it expects to pull in $200 million in revenue this year. “We joke about it because we build more affordable housing for non-profit clients than anybody else in the region,” says Andrew Beyer, company vice president.

While the company obviously makes money off those projects, it shares the talent of it’s employees at no charge. The company’s dedication to the communities where it works, sustainability and the construction industry in general, are reasons why Northwest Construction chose Walsh as the 2009 Contractor of the Year.

Environmentalism is part of the Northwest culture. Walsh has long been an advocate, and is willing to share its results with the industry as a whole.

Andrew Beyer

It started investigating how to make sustainable buildings before LEED was even developed. “We saw the building envelope as the most critical part of the building when it comes to energy savings and building integrity,” says Beyer. The company started researching walls, windows and exterior skins and the best ways to put them together to create a watertight building. Two on-staff architects devote their time to building envelopes and sustainability. Now they share the research the company has developed with construction and design organizations throughout North America.

“We call them the skin doctors. Walsh brings the best minds in the world to Portland to talk about envelope design and sequencing,” says Kurt Haapala, an associate architect with Mahlum’s Portland office. “It’s essential to save energy and prevent mold.” Walsh and Mahlum have worked on dozens of projects over the past 20 years.

The company also shows it dedication by encouraging project managers to become LEED certified, and now has a total of 44 LEED aps.

Other aspects of sustainable construction piqued Walsh’s interest when it renovated the EcoTrust Building over 10 years ago. That’s when Walsh first heard about wood from sustainable forests, according to literature provided by EcoTrust. With testimonials about the product from Walsh, many Portland area contractors were willing to try it.

advertisement

The company is putting it’s own capital behind sustainability as well. It installed solar power on its facilities earlier this year. The system will produce 29.25 kilowatts of electricity, resulting in a 15% reduction in purchased electricty. The company also purchases wind power to help offset its electricity use.

Employees regularly volunteer for charitable projects, such as Habitat for Humanity. Recently employees built two LEED Silver homes, the first green Habitat houses in the Portland area. The homes contained locally produced building materials, and a gray water system that uses rain runoff to water the lawns.

Current Walsh projects include:

Thornton Place

Thornton Place will be home to 50,000 sq ft of retail and restaurants and a 14-screen, all digital Regal Cinema with an IMAX screen. Residents will also be able to walk to the remodeled Northgate Mall, the Northgate Library, and the Northgate Community Center.

The Mercy Corps Headquarters promises to revive the Old Town area of downtown Portland. (Photo courtesty of Walsh)

Walsh broke ground on the housing portion of the project in July 2007. It includes two wood-frame apartment buildings and six condominium buildings. The project team aims for LEED silver certification for the buildings and a LEED neighborhood development designation for the community.

Walsh is building all of the housing on the site, which includes market rate apartments and condos. One of the condominium buildings opened in April. Walsh also recently completed the $9.8-million Thornton Creek Water Quality Channel for the Seattle Public Utilities, which runs through the site.

During the 1960s, developers had rerouted a natural creek through a 60 inch pipe and placed a parking lot on top. Now, Walsh has restored it to a free-flowing channel with landscaping and pedestrian pathways.

Nearly three acres of green space will surround the newly created Thornton Creek Water Quality Channel, which will naturally filter the runoff bound for Lake Washington. The project includes a network of walking and biking paths, as well as a park-and-ride lot with transportation connections to downtown Seattle.

Bob Walsh

Already registered as a LEED for Neighborhood Development (LEED-ND) pilot project, Thornton Place also expects to achieve a LEED Silver ranking for new construction by completion. This rating will result in lower operating costs and a healthier environment for residents. Residences will feature water efficient fixtures and Energy Star appliances. Interiors will be finished with low-emitting paints, adhesives, and carpets.

Mercy Corps Heaquarters, Portland

The Mercy Corps World Headquarters is a renovation of an historic Portland building, the Packer-Scott building, and a new four-story building connected to it. The project is designed to LEED Platinum and is currently under construction on a tight urban site. In addition to providing space for staff and growing room for the organization, the project will include a global learning center. Rotating exhibits using up-to-date information, photos and video from field offices will bring Mercy Corps’ mission to life and encourage visitors to take action long after they leave.

Up to 200 employees will support the agency’s humanitarian work in more than 35 countries around the world. The agency is not using funds donated for humanitarian purposes to pay for the construction.

Salishan HOPE VI

The Salishan HOPE VI project is an ongoing neighborhood revitalization project in Tacoma, Wash. Walsh began work in 2004 and is currently constructing the $32 million fifth and sixth 90-unit project phases. When complete, its team will have built 540 housing units, as well as infrastructure improvements on 68 of the project’s 180 acres. “Success at Salishan has been exceptional: the hiring and contracting goals have all been surpassed, all units have been delivered ahead of schedule and exceeded the client’s quality expectations. Cost savings have been returned on each phase,” says Beyer.

Kibbie Dome

Moscow, Idaho – Major construction work on the west wall of the University of Idaho’s ASUI-Kibbie Activity Center took a time out in May to make the facility available for the school’s 2009 commencement ceremony.

The Kibbie Dome, at the University of Idaho, is a being renovated by Walsh Construction.

The center, locally known as the “Kibbie Dome,” is a multiuse athletic/recreation/special-event facility. Its roof, completed in 1975, is made up of beams of laminated wood on a framework of tubular-shaped steel. The huge arches span a distance of 400 ft and at the center height are 144 ft above the surface of the playing field.

The dome has a floor area of 93,550 sq ft and a seating capacity for football of 16,000.

Walsh started work on a $10-million project in early April to address life-safety issues in the dome by replacing its wooden west wall with a noncombustible structure. Opsis Architects, Portland, designed the project, and DCI Engineers, also of Portland, provided structural engineering.

“We are replacing the wood end wall with structural steel and translucent panels,” says Bill Melrose, project manager for Walsh. The surface of the wall measures 50,000 sq ft, and building it will require 200 tons of structural steel, he adds.

The exterior skin surface will be a combination of metal panels plus the translucent panels.

Working the structural-steel pieces through the scaffolding on the end of the building for placement inside has been a challenge, Melrose says.

Part of the Mercy Corps Headquarters calls for renovation of an existing building. (Photo courtesy of Walsh)

Other aspects of the work at the west end of the dome include building exit stairs on either side of the playing field and placing a precast pedestrian bridge outside. The project also will add fire suppression in the interstitial space in the dome’s roof structure, install handrails in the seating aisles and provide for some of the required smoke exhaust systems.

Construction materials and equipment are being staged in parking lots around the dome.

Walsh is using protective fencing and security guards to keep students on the busy campus a safe distance away from the work area, Melrose says.

Despite stopping work to accommodate the commencement ceremony, Walsh is on track to complete the project in time for the opening home game of the University of Idaho Vandals football team in the fall. - Carl Molesworth.

Current Project Teams

Mercy Corps Headquarters

Salishan IV

Kibbie Dome

Habitat Houses